Theo Hanks's hands just wouldn't stop shaking.He read the words for a fourth time, as if repetition might somehow change them.NO BIOLOGICAL RELATIONSHIP.Fifteen good years. Fifteen years of piggyback rides and fevers at 3 a.m. and a gap-toothed voice calling him Baba like it was the easiest word in the world. All of it sitting in his lap now, reduced to a single line of black ink that didn't care how much he'd loved his own daughter.The steering wheel dug into his palms. He realized he was gripping it until his knuckles turned white.Sixteen years married to Tracey Teague Hanks. Sixteen years of believing he'd won some impossible lottery, the poor fisherman's son who married the girl every casting director in the city eventually wanted. He'd watched her body change with the pregnancy and somehow come out the other side more beautiful, not less, her face untouched by time in a way that used to make him laugh and call her unfair.He hadn't known the word for what she really was, but

She was still beautiful when she was lying to him. That was the part that gutted him most.Forty years old and she still looked like she'd stolen someone else's twenties. Her skin unlined, those almond eyes remained ever bright and youthful, that particular glow money and adoration bought for the very famous people. Theo had spent sixteen years grateful for that face. Now he studied it the way a man studies a forged signature, looking for the seam or some crack in it."What's that supposed to be, Theo?" Tracey tilted her head, amused, patient, every inch the woman who'd never once in sixteen years been told no. “You don’t like your food?”He frowned impatiently when she didn’t look at the paper, "The more I sit here, Tracey, the more sure I get that you've had another man."The amusement instantly disappeared from her face, replaced by something flat and dangerous. "Watch what you're saying to me." Her voice dropped, the warmth gone out of it entirely. "A joke only stays funny so long

Theo went straight back to the bar, his mind heavy with unanswered questions. He walked up to the counter and asked to see the surveillance footage from the night before, desperate for any proof of who had pulled him out of his drunken stupor."The cameras?" The woman behind the bar didn't even look up from the glass she was wiping down. She was blonde too, her hair pulled back into a messy bun that did little to hide her sharp, dismissive eyes. "They're basically just for show, honey. Wiring's shot, half of them aren't even plugged in. I'm not going to be able to help you."Theo stared at her for a moment. With the dull, throbbing weight of his hangover still lingering, his guard was down, and a question slipped out before he could stop himself."Was it you who took me to the hotel last night?"The moment the words left his mouth, Theo realized how inappropriate he sounded.The bar owner paused, threw her head back, and laughed out loud. "Me? No, no, no," She looked him up and down,

Jason Cavill stared at the expedited paternity test reports sitting on his desk, utterly stunned.The documents, bearing the official stamps of three separate accredited laboratories, all pointed to the exact same damning conclusion: Theo Hanks and Hope Hanks shared no biological relationship whatsoever.Theo had been right all along.Could Tracey really have cheated on him? Jason thought, a cold sweat breaking out across his forehead.This was no small matter. If a scandal like this broke into the press, it wouldn’t just tear a family apart—it would incinerate a multi-million-dollar career built on a spotless public image. Jason didn't dare make any decisions on his own or let the documents sit for another minute. He grabbed the folder, drove straight to Tracey’s private residence, and followed her into the study, closing the heavy double doors behind them.Without a word of small talk, he laid the reports on her mahogany desk.Tracey picked them up, her eyes scanning down to the fin

Theo Hanks sat at the bar and drained his glass in one single, burning gulp.He hadn't expected Tracey to be this shameless. She was so infuriating.Even after running the paternity test through her own channels, she still stubbornly refused to accept the result. He had explicitly reminded her that Hope must have been conceived around the exact same month they got married, yet she still refused to admit a single thing. He had even told her again that he didn't want a single dime of her money and only wanted a quiet, clean divorce, but she just kept playing her emotional cards. What else did she want from him?!Was it simply because she had money and power, while he was nothing more than an insignificant, replaceable clinical doctor?That had to be it. In her eyes, he was easy to control. As long as she kept him obediently at home to maintain her perfect public image, she could do whatever she wanted outside while he remained in the dark like a puppet.Damn it.Theo gripped the empty